Tragedy, Corneille and Racine

Another attempt to bring back the ancient form had been going on for some time across the English Channel, in France. The French Classical tragedy, whose monuments are Pierre Corneille's Cid (1637) and Jean Racine's Bérénice (1670) and Phèdre (1677), made no attempt to be popular in the way of the Elizabethan theatre. The plays were written by and for intellectual aristocrats, who came together